16.11.11

Finally!

WE'RE ENGAGED!!
( now this blog doesn't seem as pathetic of me to make )

Photo by: Vina English

I still cant believe this day is finally here!
I have been dreaming of this moment my whole life,
Been imagining the 'perfect man for me' for forever
and have been wishing for this boy since last August 2010

he has been waiting for the perfect moment, and the perfect ring for me
(im now finding out he's missed a months worth of class so he could go
check out every jewelry store from Provo to Salt Lake 
trying to find the perfect ring!)

AND IT WAS MORE THAN PERFECT!
  
I look at it glimmer and sparkle every chance I get!
and I walk around with my left hand ALWAYS exposed 
hellooo..! I am engaged to my dream boy and I want the world to know! :)

We are getting married JANUARY 17th 
our one year anniversary!
(I have always told myself I would date a guy for a year before marrying him, so now I have, and Im not waiting a day longer!! 

I love this boy with all of my heart!
We occasionally look at each other and say,
"wait, your Eric Espinel!?"
or
"Wait, Im dating Lyndsi Beckstrom!?"
we still cant believe how lucky we are to find each other
we are best friends
and we are in love
who could ask for a more amazing relationship, right?

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when the time comes, we can't wait to be sealed in the temple 
to be with one another for eternity!
that moment will be so special to Eric and I.
I cant imagine how good it will feel to know I am with him for 
eternity and beyond...

working up to that moment is making us appreciate our love for each other
and our love for the gospel on a level I never have thought i could feel.

message to everyone reading this: 
please don't take the gospel so casually and for granted. 
Appreciate the amazing power of the atonement and, when the time comes, share with your loved one how important the gospel is to you.
Remember that God will never leave your side
and that sometimes your answers will come in their own time and as a shock,
but if you put full trust in the Lord, everything will turn out ok!

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now no more mushy stuff.. down the the dirty details!

the LIFE & the PROPOSAL

Last year. August 2010.
Our first kiss.. 
happened the night before I moved down to St. George for 5 months
(nice timing Eric..)

August 2010 - December 2010.
I had the biggest crush on Eric that entire semester.
Wishing for him every time the clock hit 11:11 turned into an inside joke with me and my friends, but I still did it every time without fail.

During this time I heard rumors that Eric "cared for me like a sister"
haha, but being as pathetic as I am, I didnt care and still wished for him.
a week before moving back home to Draper in December 2010 I got a random text from Eric saying, 

"Hey lyndsi, I want you to know that I hope you dont 
think that I consider you a sister, I really do care about 
you alot and I cant wait till you move back home!"
seems like Eric found out i heard those rumors.. look whose pathetic now, Eric! ;)

I casually texted him back some 3 word text acting like i didnt care.. but secretly i was jumping for joy all around my apartment!


The first day I moved into my orem apartment in December, 
Eric came to visit me
Since then, we havent spent a day apart!
(besides Seattle, WA)
wah..wah..wahh...


We became "official" January 17, 2011
and in mid February we buried a time capsule with a bunch of random trinkets and notes to "future us."
right before we buried it Eric told me he forgot to put a letter in it, so he ran out to his car, grabbed the letter and stuck it in the time capsule, 
locking it up right after. 
I didnt think anything of it
(and almost forgot about that till we got engaged)
we buried it in my backyard 3 feet deep
and it was not to be opened for 3 years!!


November 2011.
on 11.11 (november 11th) I came home from work and my dad had told me he was fixing a sprinkler and accidentally dug up our time capsule! 
I was so bummed and ran outside with eric to rebury it. 
Eric asked if we can just take a peek inside.
After stubbornly saying "not for 3 more years!" eric finally convinced me to take a quick peek at what we had put in there.
He conveniently had the key to the time capsule in his pocket, haha.
when i opened it there was the note he had locked in there in February when we first buried it
it said 'READ ME.' so eric told me it was ok to read it..
after 2 pages of mushy stuff, it said:

"im sure your wondering why we opened this time capsule before our 3 year mark.. and its because i want to ask you.. will you marry me?"


long story short, eric wrote this letter in February, and knew he wanted to marry me when we very first met, and this note has just been sitting there buried in my freakin back yard this entire time!!!!!

These pictures are from FEBRUARY
when we first buried the time capsule:
 stupid note was in there this whole time
just hanging out buried in my backyard


  The Proposal 
November 11, 2011




My bling-bling


27.9.11

The Dirty Dash


The best 6 miles I have ever run!
This was by far the funnest 10k ever! I am so excited for next year! its an annual thing for Eric and I now! 

This was the course map:


Eric stayed with me the entire 6 miles
He was so sweet helping me with some of the obstacles.
...but most the time he would just push me down into the mud!!
haha I loved getting so muddy and not caring about how gross I felt!
   
Cartwheeling down a mud hill

cannon-balling into a giant mud pit 

Crawling through soggy mud tunnels
 
and somersaulting down a giant slip n' slide...

LOVED IT!













So many fun memories with this boy!  

After the race, Eric and I were too cheap to pay $4 each for a warm shower
So we stood under a pipe that had the melted 
snow from the mountain wash us off!!
It was FREEZING!!!
We decided to just drive home half muddy 
because we couldn't take the cold shower anymore!

the best part of showering off all the mud was cleaning out my ears!
SO GROSS to see how much mud got lodged in there!
but we felt extra squeaky clean after a long morning in the mud!
Free mud facials :)





 

15.9.11

the future business


Girlfriend broke your Galaxy Tab screen? 
Don't want to pay $600 for a new one?
Don't want to pay $175 for someone to fix your screen?
DONT WORRY!
come on down to "Eric & Stoopid girlfriend!"
We fix all the screens that dumb girlfriends break for only $27
and we do it ourselves! 

see our latest work of the before and after screen ...




We also do Spider Cleaning...

Just call Eric Espinel 
and he will spyder proof your room to perfection!

Erics latest work:

 


Our services include:


Just call us at 1-800-ERIC-IS-AMAZING

24.8.11

short clip

this was during the beginning of summer.. time FLEW by! 
I found this in my piles of videos I have.
:)




i think near the end we were making fun of BYU students... 
even though Eric is at BYU...
hahaha

9.8.11

dates, music and 'the challenge'

June July ..August??

since this summer decided to speed by so fast, and Eric and I have done too many things to write, I thought a nice picture show would help describe how amazing this summer has been with the most amazing boy!

This 2011 summer was full of:
spontaneous adventures
road trips
family vacations
band practice and performances
romantic and creative dates
friends
work :(
sunshine
emotion
notes
understanding 
flowers
tons of laughter
inside jokes
and most of all.. love!

These pictures are only a few compared to the hundreds I have taken this summer. I can only put up so many.. but when it comes down to deciding its so hard to pick my favorite ones, because i love them all! i love the memories they bring back and the moments that were captured! 
I am the worst at being frugal with picture taking.. I ALWAYS have to have my camera and I ALWAYS have to be taking pictures or video of moments that are way too fun and memorable to only experience once.
so here are the "few" pictures i picked out to share:



Summer Dates:

Eric is the best at finding original and creative date ideas.. 
and this one was out of this world... literally! haha
During this group date called "iworlds" there is an incredibly realistic space station that you enter. At the beginning, you are assigned ranks and have a ten minute tutorial of your 'job' on the ship.
you are then assigned a mission.
Eric was Captain of the ship, and I was assigned Weapons control. Haylie Michels was Ambassador, Steve and Kelsea were security and Eric Michels was Alien Translator.. 
there were many other positions that other earthlings filled.
In this game you go through a simulator and try to complete your mission..which was to rescue people on a distant planet, and survive! but the only way you can accomplish this is if everyone is doing their job and working together. I highly recommend this for a group date! We laughed so hard the entire time! I felt like a true Star Trek Warrior
 

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  R o c k  C l i m b i n g
 Definitely our new favorite thing! 
it looks easy..
but it was challenging! I was so sore the next day


Star gazing
One of my most favorite and relaxing things to do is look at the stars.. and not just a couple dots of light in the city sky... i love a glittery sky completely full of them! Eric knows this and planned a special date for me.
He surprised me and drove all the way to snowbird.. I was so confused at first, I thought all that mountain had to offer was winter snowboarding.. but i was so wrong! we took a tram up to the tippy top of the mountain, the stars were amazing!! I never knew our sky was full of so many of them! There were telescopes up there for us to look through and see the stars up close! the astronomers were so funny to listen to and you could tell they were so passionate about their job. One telescope was zoomed into the moon so close, you could see every detail on it! 
this was one of the most memorable and
cutest moments with my favorite boy!

all i have to say is.. well done, eric. well done ;)


 this is about what the moon and stars looked like :)

one of the telescopes! it was freezing up on that mountain!!

after our starry night date, eric took me back home for midnight crepes, 
if you havent had a crepe from 'Roll Up' in Provo yet.. get one! sooo yum!



Cooking Lessons
We decided to invent our own lunch and it turned out pretty good :) 
This meal and Indiana Jones.. perfection!


Draper Days
Elder Eric Michels, called to serve in the Kyiv, Ukraine mission on December 21, 2011
...words cant describe how much you will be missed...
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Bear Lake 
Beckstrom Family Reunion





Two weeks after Eric came home from Seattle, Washington we went on our Beckstrom Family Reunion to Bear Lake. It was the best beginning of our summer together! I cant believe how fast its all gone by, but I'm so happy that every second of it was spent with the one person I wanted to spend it with!
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"The Hideout"


Eric Michels, Eric Espinel, Steve Michels, Seth Dunshee
these boys are each individually so talented! 
put them together and you have an amazing band!
Their music is so catchy and fun, and they all mold so perfectly together!
i LOVE going to watch them practice and perform and small shindigs
they are performing at Alta High School Saturday August 13th at night
come watch and support them! you wont be disappointed!

http://www.reverbnation.com/ericandstevemichels

^ look them up! ^

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THE CHALLENGE!!!
'The Challenge' is a game we made up years ago,
and it has forever since been our favorite game! 
In 'the challenge' each person writes down a challenge for the loser to do and we draw one out of a hat. Then everyone lines up and take turns throwing a quarter into a small cup.. 
the last person to make it in, has to do the challenge! 
it gets really intense and some challenges SUCK to do!
one night, Eric Espinel and Steve Michels both lost for the first time in the same night!
Truely a moment in Challlenge history!

 
Steve Michels

Eric Espinel
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goodbye summer... Hello FALL!

4.8.11

July 4th


  HAPPY (late) 4th of JULY
This July 4th was amazing! during the weekend, Eric and I went to Pocatello, Idaho. we went boating all day Saturday! Eric was pretty upset that I "forgot" my toenail polish remover. I painted his toes the day before, so he tried chipping the paint off all the way to Idaho!

 On July 4th, I worked till 2 pm so I missed all the parades and breakfasts.. :( ... but we still had a full day of fun and fireworks ahead of us! 
Eric and I were both really sick this day. Eric had a bad cough with a stuffy nose, and I had a hot fever with a stomach ache all day... but we sucked it up cause this was the FOURTH OF JULY!!! :)
First was a BBQ at the Van Hoffs, and even tho I didn't plan on swimming, Eric and my dad thought it would be so funny to throw me in the pool with all my clothes on... 
it wasn't
but don't worry, I pulled, nicely dressed, Eric in too soon after =]

when we went home to shower and change we raced over to my cousins BBQ! We only stayed long enough to introduce Eric to all the Beckstrom family, and then we raced down to Sugarhouse park to watch fireworks with Erics parents and our friends! I absolutely love fireworks, I think the idea of them is so romantic! The day could have been so stressful with all our confusing and crazy schedules and how sick we felt... but it ended so perfectly! 

1.7.11

there are so many of us now!

look how cute our family pictures turned out!
these are a sneak peak of just a few of them...
they aren't edited but you get the idea :)



(Eric had to borrow the clothes at the studio since he forgot his own... Eric... you are not a Mexican and you are not from the 90's... lose the shirt..) 
 ah.. the Beckstroms... 
how our family has grown!
2011
2005
Traditional 'Secret Agent' Picture
I don't know how or why this one got started..
but I think we thought it was cool one time 
and just keep doing it...

AND LOOK AT COOPER!! AHHH! 
SQUEEZE HIM!!! so cute! 



My favorite! <3 

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Now don't get too excited... were not engaged!
my family just loves Eric enough to let him feel what it would be like to be a Beckstrom ;)